We all have to meet our match sometime or other. -- Richard Adams, Watership Down
The rain began within a few minutes of the door closing behind them. The board over the window stopped the worst of the rain getting in. But it wasn't completely waterproof. Abi idly watched a few rivulets trickle down the wood to pool on the windowsill. In the background Kitri, Ilaran and Irímé were busy discussing the proper wording and various clauses to put in the contract. Abi listened for a while. Kitri's overly-elaborate magistrate's terminology very quickly became too much for her to understand, so she gave up and tried to find something else to focus on.
Koyuki was still in the kitchen, keeping a close eye on the sweets. If he had been less preoccupied with cookery she would have tried to talk to him. It would be nice to speak Seroyawan again. Assuming he spoke a dialect she understood, that was. Even the version of common Seroyawan spoken in the royal court was more elaborate than the version spoken by people in rural villages.
In his snake form Shizuki curled up in front of the fire and went to sleep. That left Siarvin as the only one of them all who wasn't preoccupied. He still occasionally shot dark looks in Abi's direction. She couldn't for the life of her think what was wrong with him. Surely he didn't object to her attacking Haliran?
She weighed up the pros and cons of speaking to him. On the one hand it might very well lead to an argument. On the other, anything was better than watching the rain slip through the cracks.
"Why do you keep glaring at me?" she asked.
Siarvin blinked slowly. He looked surprisingly like Shizuki in that moment. "You're a necromancer."
Oh no. Yet another person who had a prejudice against necromancy. "None of my creations have hurt anyone."
"Yet," Siarvin said pessimistically. "None of them have hurt anyone yet."
After that there seemed little point in continuing the conversation.
~~~~
The rain had stopped by the time Abi left. She hadn't paid much attention to what was happening on the other side of the room, mainly because she only understood one word in ten, but she was fairly sure the contract was signed. Irímé was already making preliminary travel arrangements. He certainly didn't waste any time. Shizuki had awakened and was happily stamping bits of scrap paper with Kitri's vashad. Siarvin and Kitri herself didn't look very happy about this. Koyuki still hadn't ventured out of the kitchen. Abi was beginning to think he just didn't want to talk to strangers.
Ilaran followed her to the door. "You know the assassins will probably target you next?" he said quietly.
Abi nodded slowly. Assassins weren't unknown in Seroyawa. The emperor alone had escaped eighty different attempts in the time she was fostered there. Some of those attempts had also been aimed at various other members of the royal family, bodyguards, or politicians who happened to be nearby. Not all of them were as lucky as the emperor.
She knew she had painted a target on her back the minute she'd attacked Haliran. But she also remembered Haliran's attempt to blackmail her. Why would anyone go to the trouble of assassinating her before first making another effort to get her on their side?
She said as much to Ilaran. He didn't look convinced.
"The assassins aren't interested in furthering Haliran's goals. They want to keep themselves from being caught. The best way to do that is to get rid of anyone they know is an enemy."
Abi thought of the corpse in the crypt. "Don't worry. I have a... Well, you could call her a bodyguard."
Ilaran guessed what she was thinking of. "That damn corpse isn't a bodyguard." He hesitated before the word 'damn'. She got the impression he wanted to use a stronger word.
"She is now I've ordered her to protect me."
Despite how confidently she spoke, Abi walked through the palace gates with a growing sense of foreboding. It increased with every step. The crypt was a good distance away. Assuming she was attacked, even assuming the corpse did sense she was in danger, how could it get out of the coffin, up the stairs, and all the way from the main entrance in time to help her? With a shudder she remembered how heavy the stone coffin lid was. Could the corpse even manage to open it alone?
~~~~
There was still a great deal Abi didn't know about necromancy. To be fair to her, she knew this and acknowledged it -- though not out loud. She didn't know, for instance, that the corpse's limited awareness was tied to her magic. She also didn't know that her magic reacted to her emotions. It sensed she was worried, it sensed she knew of a threat to her life, and it instinctively prepared to defend her.
Down in the crypt the corpse stirred. One driving thought filled its brain. Its creator was in danger. It had to protect her.
With its stiff and clumsy hands it pushed at the lid with all its strength. Unlike a living person it never got tired and never felt pain. Inch by inch the stone slid back. The corpse staggered out into the open air. It had no need to take stock of its surroundings. Once again Abi's magic drew it like a beacon.
~~~~
Arrogant fool, Ilaran thought as Abihira walked away. She's going to get herself killed soon.
He went back into the house. A sudden feeling of unease made him stop on the doorstep and look back. Abi was already out of sight. There was no sound of a disturbance or struggle. He stepped into the hall. The uneasy feeling strengthened. It grew worse as he slowly walked towards the sitting room door.
Ilaran stopped. Years of knowing people were trying to kill him had taught him there was often a reason for seemingly-irrational worry. Sometimes his magic could sense a threat he didn't.
Instead of going into the sitting room he opened the door to his bedroom. His knives sat on the shelf beside the door. He picked them up and set out after Abihira.
~~~~
Even though the rain was over the pavement was still very wet. Puddles gathered in every crack in the stones. No matter how much she tried to avoid standing in them Abi found her footsteps made constant splashing noises. The most oblivious person in the world couldn't have failed to hear her. Worse, the splish-splash of her own footsteps made it almost impossible to hear anything else. Was that someone else walking through a puddle or just an echo? Or it might even be water dripping off leaves. She had no way of knowing. That uncertainty only increased her jumpiness.
It was almost a relief when she saw someone else ahead. Finally her alarm had something tangible to focus on instead of trying to convince her the slightest sound meant there were assassins lurking in the hedgerows.
At first glance there was nothing truly suspicious about the woman walking towards her. She wore the practical, unostentatious clothes of a senior maid or junior housekeeper. Abi almost dismissed her as a random passer-by only there by chance. When she took a closer look she spotted all the seemingly minor things that contradicted such a surmise.
A servant would always have keys at her waist. Whether they were the keys to every room in a mansion or just to her own lodgings, she would never venture out without them securely tied to her belt in case she misplaced them or got locked out. They would clank as she moved, making enough noise to be heard from a distance. This woman's movements were silent apart from the water splashing underfoot.
Not only that, a servant would only go out at this time of the afternoon, when everyone was busy getting dinner ready, setting the table, and preparing the dining room, if she had to do some emergency shopping. Under such circumstances she would carry a large basket to hold the groceries. This woman had nothing in her hands at all. She was going in the wrong direction to be on her way to the shops, and she had no purchases to suggest she was coming from them.
Warning bells rang in Abi's head. Something was wrong here.
She advanced slowly, trying to pretend she hadn't a care in the world and didn't even realise there was someone ahead of her. The other woman continued to walk towards her. As she drew nearer an idea struck Abi. Criminals tended to avoid targeting people who could identify them. She couldn't remember where she'd heard that. Now was as good a time as any to find out if it was true.
Looking the woman right in the face, she said, "Excuse me, do you know what time it is?"
The woman started. With a wary look at Abi she took her watch out of her pocket. "It's ten past four."
"Thank you very much," Abi said. She made sure she kept her tone light.
She walked past the woman without a backwards glance. Instinctively she felt sure she was staring at her. The faintest rustle of cloth was the only warning she got.
Abi leapt away. The knife slashed through the air where she had been a second ago.
~~~~
Down in the crypt the stone coffin stood empty. Its lid was propped against the wall. Its former occupant clambered stiffly up the stairs. As soon as she was safely out on level ground she ran at a surprising speed to find and defend her creator.
~~~~
An angry exclamation some distance ahead was the first warning Ilaran got that there was someone else around. The next one was the distinctive metallic sound of a blade scraping against stone. He drew his knife and walked faster. He broke into a run when he heard someone cry out.
He rounded the corner to see a terrifying sight. A stranger who could only be an assassin held a knife within an inch of Abihira's throat. The blade was so close to her skin that it had already nicked her cheek. Abihira clung for dear life to the assassin's wrist. Her own strength was the only thing holding her attacker at bay.
If Ilaran had his bow and arrow he could have killed the assassin from a distance. Unfortunately he kept them in the window seat in his bedroom. They were of less practical use than a knife if he needed to defend himself. He should have realised he would need them to defend someone else.
The assassin's back was to him. She didn't see him approach. But Abihira did. He could have killed the assassin without her even knowing he was there if Abihira hadn't looked so obviously in his direction. Suspecting something, the assassin turned her head. Ilaran swung the knife at her neck. She dodged. He missed and cut her arm instead.
The cut was too shallow to do any real damage. It did throw off her aim, though. She lashed out with her own knife. It missed Ilaran's ear by several inches. Vaguely he thought he heard running footsteps drawing nearer. There was no time to stop and listen.
I hope that's Siarvin and not another assassin, was all he thought about it.
Abihira kicked the assassin in the stomach. She doubled over in pain. Her knife dropped out of her hand. Abihira grabbed it and stabbed deep into her neck. At the same moment Ilaran drove his knife into her back. The assassin made a wheezing, gasping noise that suggested he'd hit her lung.
Either a slashed throat or a punctured lung would likely have proved fatal before she could get medical attention. Both of them, inflicted almost simultaneously, were too much even for an immortal. Within minutes her feeble death throes were over.
Ilaran knelt down and pulled her knife out of her back. He'd stabbed with so much force that it took considerable effort to get it free. Abihira stared at the body with wide eyes. For someone so obsessed with death and the dead she didn't seem too happy to have caused a death.
~~~~
The assassin's death didn't calm Abi's magic. It remained agitated and ready to lash out. The corpse influenced by it continued to believe there was an immediate threat to her safety.
A dead body didn't register as a threat. A living person holding a knife did.
In the course of the brief fight its participants had gotten turned around. Both Ilaran and Abihira were now facing in the direction of Siarvin's house. Both of them had their backs to anyone or anything coming behind them.
~~~~
How strange, Abi thought faintly. She took several deep breaths to steady her stomach. Corpses never bothered me before.
Somehow there was something especially disturbing about a corpse that had been a living person mere minutes ago. A skeleton or a decomposing, bloated body were gruesome in their own way. They just weren't as gruesome as this.
The assassin's blood continued to pour from her wounds even after death. It mingled with the rain water until she lay in a large red pool. The bloody water moved closer and closer to Abi's feet. She took a step back.
Bad idea. Moving at all made her stomach roil. She retched into the hedge. If she'd eaten anything recently she would have been sick. In some ways actually being sick would have been preferable to gagging and dry-heaving for what felt like several minutes. At least it would have been over quicker.
At the back of her mind she was dimly aware of approaching footsteps. She felt so queasy that this knowledge barely even registered.
Abi turned away from the hedge on legs that were suddenly unsteady. Ilaran had politely pretended not to notice her retching. He was busily occupied in wiping his knife clean on the corpse's clothes. The sight of the blade still streaked with blood made Abi's stomach roil again.
"It's all right," Ilaran said, straightening up. He didn't look at her as he slid his knife back into its holder. "Everyone feels sick the first time they kill someone."
Out of the corner of her eye Abi caught a flicker of red. She turned. A figure barrelled past her and knocked her to the ground. Abi opened her mouth to shout an insult to the rude passer-by. She froze with her mouth still hanging open. It was the corpse she'd raised. Those muddy funeral clothes were unmistakeable.
Everything happened in an instant. Ilaran only realised there was someone else there in the same instant the corpse shoved Abi aside. He looked round. At the exact same moment the corpse lunged at him.
It sank its teeth into his neck.
The world took on a bizarre dreamlike haze. Abi felt like a detached spectator watching from somewhere far away. Bright red blood spurted from Ilaran's neck. It was the same colour as the blood that had sprayed from the assassin's throat minutes before. The red was so vivid it leached all the colour from the world. A piercing scream echoed in her ears. With a dull sort of surprise Abi realised she was the one screaming. The corpse let go of Ilaran. He fell to his knees. The pavement was soaked in red all around him. He pressed both hands against the bite-mark. Blood streamed between his fingers.
Fury welled up within her. The sort of fury that appeared cold to everyone else but was white-hot to her. Abi struck the corpse with all her magic. It was incinerated on the spot. Only a few fragments of ash remained, spots of grey amidst all the red.
Abi never knew how she went from lying on the ground to kneeling beside Ilaran. The only thing she remembered clearly was his blood soaking her hands. She tried futilely to heal him with her magic. She'd never studied any healing spells beyond the most basic ones. She didn't know how to mend blood vessels or close such a large wound.
Ilaran opened and closed his mouth soundlessly. He stared at her intently, as if trying telepathically to make her understand what he wanted to say. For a minute after she reached him he was still conscious. Then his eyes glazed over. His arms dropped limply at his sides. His head fell against her shoulder. The blood pouring out of his neck slowed from a stream to a trickle. Abi continued trying desperately to heal the wound. When her magic didn't work she pressed her hand to his neck and tried to stop the bleeding. Even then she knew it was useless. But she couldn't stop. She couldn't-- She couldn't--
She knelt in the pool of his blood for five minutes or an eternity. It was all over her hands, her clothes, his clothes.
That was how Siarvin found her. With the assassin's corpse on the ground beside her and Ilaran's corpse in her arms.